Nutella Ice Cream (chocolate-hazelnut) (vegan)

Place your hazelnuts, sugar, and salt in a food processor or high-powered blender and begin grinding.  This process may take a while, and you might need to let your machine rest a few times if it gets too hot. The nuts will break up quickly, then begin to clump up as the oils start to be released. You may need to break up the clumps a few times to keep them processing. Keep going until you have the texture of a coarse nut butter.

While the nuts are grinding, chop your solid chocolate if needed (no need if you're using chocolate chips), then place it in a microwave-safe bowl. Microwave at 50% power for 20 seconds. Stir. Microwave again at 50% power for 20 seconds. Stir again. Keep doing this until your chocolate is melted, but take care not to overheat it. I like to stop microwaving before the chocolate is fully melted and let the residual heat finish melting the chocolate, while I move on to the next step.

Continue processing the nuts and scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed. The nuts will progress from dry crumbles to clumpy/oily crumbles to (eventually) something that looks like a smooth nut butter. When you are close to a smooth nut butter, add the remaining dry ingredients: cocoa powder and xanthan gum (if using). 

At this stage you should have a sweetened, chocolate, smooth nut butter, and you are ready to add the liquid ingredients. First, drizzle in the melted chocolate and pulse to combine. Then add the agave syrup and vanilla and blend again. If the mixture starts to clump up, don't worry. It will smooth out in the next step. Then add the coconut milk slowly, a little at a time. (If your coconut milk has clumpy coconut cream on top, the food processor will help incorporate it smoothly.)

Depending on the size of your food processor, you may be reaching full capacity, or approaching your "max liquid" line. At this point it's easy to transfer to a large mixing bowl and whisk in the non-dairy milk by hand. Or if you have the space, add the non-dairy milk to your food processor or blender.

Transfer to a container (or keep it in the mixing bowl if you were using one) and chill in the refrigerator for 8 hours or overnight. 

For a quicker chilling time, place the bowl containing your mixture in an ice bath (a larger bowl containing ice water) for a few hours. Stir the mixture occasionally. As the water in the ice bath warms up, pour off some water and add ice to keep the mixture chilling as quickly as possible.

Ideally, the mixture will be about 40 degrees when you churn it.

Before you start churning, set up everything you'll need to quickly transfer the ice cream from the machine into a container for freezing. I use a knife to scrape down the dasher (or paddle) and a wooden spoon to scoop out the ice cream. 

Set up your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's directions. Pour (or scoop) your mixture into the ice cream maker and churn. This mixture is thick when it's chilled, so it will churn fast. Mine was ready in 15 minutes.

It's finished churning when it looks like soft-serve and is pulling away from the sides of the container.

When the ice cream has finished churning, scoop it as quickly as possible into your storage container. Cover it with plastic wrap or parchment paper, if using. (Placing a sheet of parchment paper between the container and lid will help prevent frost, or you can press plastic wrap directly onto the surface of the ice cream.) Put the container in the freezer. The ice cream will be fully firm in a few hours.